Surrender to the Will of the Night - By Glen Cook Page 0,92

all over you and Muno. I let them hear all sorts of intriguing stuff downstairs. As a result, a very nervous Serenity ought to unleash the whole power of the Church on the problem of Arlensul’s bastard.”

“Why? He shouldn’t really care.”

“Wrong. Well, maybe if he knew the whole story. What he’s been allowed to know will compel him to care.”

“Do take the trouble to explain.”

“Key point. He’s just found out that I’m still alive. That will rattle him badly. At the same time he’ll learn that there’s absolute, concrete proof that his religious vision remains incompletely triumphant. That the Old Ones, while no longer seen, are still alive. They survive in the imaginations of hundreds of thousands of rural people who attend church on all the appropriate days, then hedge their bets by following the ancient rituals when those are due. More, the Old Ones will need to be awakened and strengthened if the world isn’t to be crushed beneath the hooves of even older and darker Instrumentalities.”

Hecht said, “You may have lost me. I understand every sentence. Individually. But how do they all connect up in a way that helps us find our missing half-god?”

“Blood simple, Piper. Blood simple. Listen to what I say. I scare the crap out of Serenity by being alive. I terrify him by being eager to find Arlensul’s pup. He’s already scared Muno will make his life difficult. So he panics. And deploys all the resources of the Church to find our man for me.”

“Clever. But you might have outsmarted yourself. Look. The reason I wanted to talk in here is so I could tell you to look at Ferris Renfrow. We tried to investigate him when we were in Alten Weinberg. We didn’t find much but some odd facts did surface.”

“Such as?”

“He wasn’t well known before Johannes but somebody with the same name has been connected with most of the Emperors since the Grail Empire was founded. Today’s Ferris Renfrow claims all those other Renfrows are his ancestors. But we couldn’t find anybody who ever heard of any of the Renfrows being married. Or otherwise involved with any human being, male or female.”

“That would be unusual.”

“He does odd things, too.” Hecht repeated what he had heard about Renfrow presenting an apparent eyewitness account of the Battle of Los Naves de los Fantas to Empress Katrin the evening of the battle.

That got some attention. First in the form of denial, mostly by the Principaté. “He must have used Night things to observe the action and report back. Nobody walks the Construct but Grandfather. And Heris, now. We don’t teach anyone. We don’t tell anyone. Even the monks and nuns down there don’t know what it really does.”

Cloven Februaren was not so certain. “Someone else could have come up with a Construct of their own.” The ancient fell into a brooding silence, clearly trying to remember something.

Heris said, “If he’s a half-god and near-immortal he might not need a Construct. When was the bastard born? How long ago?”

No one knew. The child was mythical. Februaren grumbled, “At least four hundred years. Probably more.”

Hecht said, “You have an eyewitness. A participant. Inside the ascendant.”

“Who couldn’t say. Arlensul never developed any skill at grasping a place in time in the middle world. A common failing of the Night. Which has kept you alive. So far.”

Hecht said, “Whatever else, Renfrow is a place to start. Even if he isn’t our man he might know where to look.”

The Ninth Unknown blurted, “I’ve got it! When I was a boy! Younger than Pella. The Sixth Unknown was in charge. The Construct was primitive back then. But we did get more support from the Collegium.… You wouldn’t have recognized it.…”

“Grandfather! Did you have a point?”

“Oh. Sure. There was a brother who worked on the project. Something was wrong about him. Beyond being just plain creepy. A lot of brothers, especially ascetics and monks, are natural-born creepy. It has to do with the kind of personality that’s attracted to the life.…”

“Grandfather.”

“Yes. Creepy. I told my father and grandfather and his father. None of them wanted to hear it. He worked hard and didn’t do anything heinous in public. And he definitely had a talent for the work.”

Hecht said, “And his name was Brother Ferris.”

“No. It was Brother Lester. Lester … Temagat! That’s it. Temagat. He was way more interested in the Construct than anyone I’ve ever seen. Including Muno. But maybe excepting Heris. Heris is in there like a fish trying out